Present invention relates to a control method for a peripheral device connected to an external device and a printing apparatus using the control method.
Printer is one of peripheral devices connected to an external device such as a host computer. In case of abnormal state (error) in the printer itself or its printing operation, the printer informs a user of the error using a display such as an LCD panel or an LED. However, the error state continues unless the user removes the error, while a large amount of electricity is being consumed.
Generally, the user manipulates a switch to turn on or off the power to the printer. Further, even when the printer does not execute printing, large amount of electricity is always consumed to maintain a warmed-up state of the device. For this reason, if the user forgets to turn off the power, the considerably large amount of wasted electricity is not negligible.
Further, even when the printer does not execute printing operation, the display (a backup light, a fluorescent display tube etc.) and an LED display current state as long as the power is ON.
Recently, a printer is often used in a network environment and it is located distant from a user. Because of such distance, the user is often unaware of an error occurred to the printer for a while. Some network notifies the user of the occurrence of error at the printer via a host computer. However, as the user does not always monitors the host computer, the error state may not be found for hours. In this case, electricity will be wasted until the user notices the error. This poses a problem from the viewpoint of saving energy.
Further, even when the external device (host computer) is not connected to the printer, or the power of the external device that the printer is connected to is off, i.e., in a case where there is no possibility of data transmission to the printer, electricity is wastefully consumed as long as the power of the printer is on. This also poses a problem from the viewpoint of saving energy. For example, in the network environment, in a case where the printer is placed away from the external device, it is likely that the user forgets to turn off the power to the printer after the user has turned off the power of the external device.
As described above, the conventional printer continues wasting electricity until the user turns off the power, in spite of a meaningless state, i.e., an error state is not found for hours, or the power of the host computer is off and the printer is not used for hours.
Further, even in a case where the printer does not execute printing for hours though the power is on, the display and the LED continue displaying the state of the printer. Thus, the electricity is wasted by the display or the LED.
It should be noted that the above-described problem of wasting electricity is not limited to the case of conventional printer. Other peripheral devices connected to a host computer have a similar problem.